


Rose, oh pure contradiction.

by Kaesteranya



Category: Katekyou Hitman Reborn
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-05-04
Updated: 2011-05-04
Packaged: 2017-10-18 23:15:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 521
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/194359
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kaesteranya/pseuds/Kaesteranya
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He remembers her name. That's got to mean that she's important, right?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rose, oh pure contradiction.

**Author's Note:**

> This works along the premise that the fight Ryohei got into when he was younger was a nasty gang brawl thing that he could’ve actually died in.
> 
> The title is taken from the 31 Days theme for February 24, 2009. It quotes a line from the poem “self-composed epitaph”, composed by Rainier Maria Rilke.

Over the years, Kusakabe Tetsuya has realized that the measure of one’s importance in the eyes of his leader lies in whether he remembers that person’s name or not. Titles don’t count; nicknames based on habits or physical features (or, in some cases, the number or kind of disciplinary infraction) matter even less. Hibari Kyouya is the kind of man who is always thinking ten steps ahead of everyone else, studying the chessboard of life with a frightening amount of intensity, moving over it, reversing it, turning it about and occasionally destroying it altogether. Names don’t matter, when it comes to tools – only capabilities, details.

 

It is odd, then, how Hibari knew of Kyoko Sasagawa long before she became Sawada Tsunayoshi’s most precious person – he had been aware of her since the beginning, in Namimori, when he was the head prefect of their school and she was the girl on the fringes of the mafia game. Of course, asking Hibari himself about the matter was totally out of the question, if Kusakabe wished to walk away with his life. Asking Kyoko herself felt… wrong, and beyond that, Hibari was bound to find out if he went to a source that was that close to home. So, Kusakabe took advantage of the network he had built up for the Foundation, paid all of his agents for their confidentiality (it didn’t have to be much – they all knew what would happen if they fessed up and Hibari found out what they were up to) and called for a private investigation.

 

The results were slow in coming, but they came nonetheless. Childhood photographs, all of which used to belong inside a Sasagawa Family album that had gone missing sometime after the death of their parents. Yearbook stories from delinquents that used to follow Hibari around before he shook them off. A vague rumor about Ryohei Sasagawa’s grade school days with the wrong crowd and how he had always been in the company of a wild-haired kid with slanted gray eyes. A police report for a cold case involving kids and biker gangs – it was penned too vaguely for it to be of any real use, and the financials for it didn’t add up to anything beyond bribery. And, to top it all off, records involving monetary transactions straight to the Sasagawa account under the name of a fictitious friend of the family, with the earliest dated to the first month when the Namimori Disciplinary Committee started generating profit for their “protection services” and the latest from last month’s Foundation books.

 

During their next meeting over sake, it occurs to Kusakabe that now would be the perfect opportunity to tease Hibari about it, mention old childhood friends and the Girl Who Could’ve Been Good For Him Before The Horse Came Around And Made Him Gay. Kusakabe has grown wise over the years, however, and the remembrance of the destruction that stemmed out of the LAST time a sensitive topic was mentioned in a drunken Hibari’s presence made him smile in response to his boss’ questioning eyebrow, and pour them both another cup of sake each.


End file.
